Quality Peoples

On Friday morning, Indalecio and I packed up our gear and headed out for a surf trip weekend to a spot called La Ticla in Michoacan, about 6 hours south of Vallarta. He called it my bachelor party weekend. This was my first trip driving south along the coast and as we drove, I marked off each of the towns whose surf breaks I’ve heard about, but never been. Chacalatepic, Arroyo Seco, Pasquales. Hundreds of lesser-known and unknown spots dot the west coast from Jalisco to Oaxaca. In 50 years I’m sure the west coast of Mexico will be a surfer’s mecca. For now, it’s a relatively unknown, unpolished gem.

The drive was awesome, I’m in love with Mexico and every new corner I find, has interesting things abound. As we drove through Jalisco, Colima and then on to Michoacan I was amazed at all the coco palm and banana fields, everywhere. Michoacan in particular is raw and undeveloped and freaking gorgeous.

As we got to La Ticla and got our bearings straight, we pulled into the bungalow and camping colony just south of the river mouth. Palapa bungalows with attached bathroom $50/night. Private room with community bathroom $20-30/night. and camping site under palapa shelter $5/night. I was feeling very mexican, with my camping hammock, so we choose the $5 option. We situated our things and headed out to the break.

Ticla is on open sea with direct exposure to southern swell. To be honest I have no idea how this spot breaks normally, because a massive swell had started the day before we got there. Unfortunately, I didn’t really find this bit of crucial information out, until just before we left (more on that later).

Ticla sits at the bottom of a wide river mouth with a gnarly section directly in front, reserved only for the most advanced surfers. The left side (rights) is a closeout beach break and the right side (lefts) is a point break that stretches for miles, almost literally. To get to to the left break, you cross the 150 foot wide river with some areas being four feet deep or more. Don’t cross too close the river mouth or it will flush you out to that nasty looking break in front, you know, the one with teeth. Friday afternoon, sets are overhead and outside sets are double overhead. It takes 15 to 20 minutes just to paddle out to the break. The waves are hard, big and fast, real fast. If there’s a wait, in between sets, it’s not more than 2 minutes. The current from the river mixed with the pounding waves, pushes you down the beach and once you get out into the line-up the current pushes you back up towards the river mouth sets.

Now that you have the layout, sort of, in your head, let’s get to specifics before this entry gets too long and winded. To be honest and to the point: Ticla handed me my ass, on a plate. I am removing my name from the intermediate surfer category and putting my name up on the beginner-immediate category. It’s like that. No joke.

These waves were big and nasty and the currents were insane. Three broken boards the first day we were there and four on Sunday. Friday afternoon, I barely managed to get into the line-up. After having not been in the water for at least three weeks, it probably wasn’t the best idea for me to have charged this wave. I managed to not catch one single wave, as I did my best to handle my impending sense of dread each time that outside set came barreling towards me. I’ve been working on my left, but this wave walls up with a shelf that drops you at least three or four feet before you gain traction and i just couldn’t get it together to drop in. I made the surfer’s paddle of shame that evening as I took a smaller wave in, on my stomach and almost thrashed myself on the rocky coastline.

Saturday morning I trudged across the river again, picked a point near the river mouth, got my feet all cut up on entering the water and paddled for a good solid 20 minutes, before turning around to realize I was way down the beach and no closer to penetrating the growing swell of incoming waves. I finally just decided to quit and got out, managing to avoid hitting any rocks.

Saturday afternoon, After a healthy nap in the hammock, I paddled out again and finally managed to stay in the lineup without losing my shit (never mind just getting out into the lineup). As luck would have it, the waves were even larger. I managed to drop into a quick A-frame, right, the ledge was at least three feet high and the wave far overhead, I rode it for about three seconds, before it closed out and I punched out the back side, the power of the wave made my guts liquify. I tried to drop in, left, on several waves but either I was too far behind on the wave or I was just too plain scared. My lowerback was a ball of knots. I headed in.

Back on the beach, I watched Adan Hernandez, Kalle Caranza and the sayulita crew rip up the large sunsets sets. Some of those waves were easily 15 feet. no joke. big, long and fast. Tubes, barrels, aerials, sheeeit. you name it, I saw it. Saturday night was by far the largest waves I have ever seen in person and those kids knew exactly what they were doing. The sun setting behind them was just the icing on the pastel de chocolate.

Sunday morning we got up for our last session before heading home. I paddled out again, this time I found my cool. At the far left side, there was a nice shoulder and after finally making it out to the break, I could sit on the shoulder as it carried me towards the rows of incoming waves. After about an hour or so, I was really feeling myself again. I escaped a few large sets and tried to get in to a few of the smaller waves with no luck. My nerves had settled and I was actually enjoying myself, feeling the first bit of control and near delight. I asked mother ocean to send me a good wave. And a few minutes later a monster outside wave came in and slammed just a enough in front of me, to not let me slip blissfully underneath. I grabbed my board and held on for dear life. The wave tossed me end-over backwards, then end-over forwards and finally I realized that my legs were sticking out of the water as I was almost doing a handstand on my board, but the foam was keeping me from righting my board out, I finally got back to the surface only to get tossed by three more large waves. Each wave tearing me like a rag doll, as I tried to hang on to my board for dear life (Indalecio, would later say that he had seen the whole thing happen and that the first two waves were easily 12-15 feet). After those four waves, I was done, I rode a smaller six foot wave on my stomach towards the beach. The water was receding, showing the rocks underneath the sand line. As the white water came in, I was knocked off my board and I knew going into the beach that there was a good chance I’d slide over the rocks and then onto the beach, I’m talking about a shifting waterline 30 feet wide and six to eight feet high. i lifted my board over my head and slid onto the sandy beach, I was almost home free when a rock put a large scratch in my back and another, a gouge in the side of my foot, luckily, my board was ding free. As I sat on the beach, recuperating, at least 10 other surfers were coming out of the water, all with a similar experience. Again, the icing on the pastel de chocolate was the guy who walked up the beach just then, with the two halves of a broken board, cut cleanly right down the middle.

I headed back to camp and had a big breakfast. As I was eating, I was talking with a guy who had been staying at Ticla for a month, from Washington. he said that it had been dead for three weeks and that the swell had rolled in on Thursday and that it was a pretty massive swell. Up until that point, I honestly thought that this was the norm at La Ticla.

Indalecio and I packed our gear and headed home, reflecting in the car about our experiences. I’d have to say that Ticla humbled me to the core, as a surfer. We have it very good in the Bahia de Banderas. Our surf spots may be small and inconsistent, but they treat us well, there are no strong currents, they are easy to access and are at least slightly predictable. Surfing in open ocean is whole ‘nother beast and I can definitely say that I have so much learning to do in the surfing sphere. My time spent at Ticla wasn’t necessarily the most fun, I’d say I took maybe three waves, with only one short ride to result from three days of surfing. But I would say that I learned more about surfing in the past three days then I have in the past year. If Ticla had been a right hander, my experience would definitely have been far different and for that reason alone, I need to go to summer-school for left handers, cuz mine just flunked.

It’s a humbling experience to have your ass kicked that hard. La Ticla was an amazing experience, for sure. and for that, I am grateful.

technorati tags: mexico, michoacan, la+ticla, surfing, surf+break